Field of the Invention: The present invention relates generally to outdoor cooking devices that use charcoal briquettes, wood, or other solid fuels as a source of energy. Specifically, the present invention relates to a portable, collapsible cooking stove that can be adapted for use with various cooking utensils, such as a barbeque grill, frying pan, pot, steamer, Dutch oven, wok, or rotisserie.
State of the Art: Outdoor cooking devices, such as charcoal and gas barbeques, have been widely used for many years and numerous designs exist in the prior art. Typically, these devices consist of a grill located above a fuel source that is contained within some form of a fuel chamber. Food is then placed on the grill for cooking. Conventional outdoor cooking stoves share a number of common weaknesses including lack of portability, lack of utility, inadequate control of air flow to the fuel, and inadequate venting and cooling of the outer stove surfaces resulting in a burn hazard.
Portability can be an important feature of an outdoor stove, as these devices are often transported away from the user's home to recreation areas and camping sites. Many prior art cooking devices have attempted to overcome the lack of portability. U.S. Pat. No. 5,797,386 to Orr; U.S. Pat. No. 5,687,704 to Lerch et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,425,352 to Gillam et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,413,087 to Jean; U.S. Pat. No. 5,404,864 to Kent, Jr.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,024,208 to Hottenroth et al.; U. S. Pat. No. 4,909,235 to Boetcker; U.S. Patent No. 4,140,099 to Newport; and U.S. Patent No. 4,046,132 to White all disclose portable, outdoor cooking devices.
A volume-efficient method of achieving portability is the utilization of a collapsible stove structure. Prior art cooking stoves such as the Newport and Kent devices provide portability using a collapsible stove structure. However, in order to collapse the stove for transportation or storage, all of these devices must be manually disassembled. Furthermore, after being collapsed for storage, manual reassembly is required before any of these stoves can be used again for cooking. Thus, a need exists for a volume-efficient, collapsible stove that is simple to both assemble for cooking and collapse for storage. In addition, such a collapsible stove should be easily adapted to different cooking methods and utensils, provide adequate control of air flow to the fuel, and allow for adequate cooling of the outer stove surfaces to reduce the potential burn hazard.